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the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion, and sorrow and sighing shall flee
away.
"Vengeance" and "recompense" are apparent again in Isa. 59: 16-21 where we read:
"The Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob,
saith the Lord" (verse 20). This verse, quoted by Paul in Rom. 11: 26 as taking place
when the fulness of the Gentiles shall come in, prevents acceptance of the interpretation
that this coming to Zion took place during the earthly life of Christ.
Isa. 63: 1-5 takes up the same theme. In Isa. 34: the scene is laid in "Bozrah
and Edom"; In Isa. 63: it is for Edom; the chapters refer to identical places. Isa. 63:
moreover, speaks of the same dual object: "The day of vengeance" and "The year of My
redeemed" (verse 4).
The reference to the garments of the Lord being stained with blood connects the
passage with Rev. 19::--
"And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and He that sat upon him . . . . .
He was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood; and His name is called the Word of God
. . . . . and He treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God"
(verses 11-16).
Isa. 63: 3 says, "I have trodden the winepress alone", and its contexts and parallels
forbid the poetic interpretation put upon it in the hymn that associates this passage with
the Lord's sufferings on the cross.
The last reference we shall make to Isaiah is that of 64: 1: "Oh that Thou wouldest
rend heavens, that Thou wouldest come down, that the mountains might flow down at
Thy presence." Israel recognizes at last that they are the clay, and the Lord the Potter
(verse 8): they beseech for mercy on the ground of being the Lord's people (verse 9).
Zion and Jerusalem are called the holy cities of the Lord, and they are described as being
a wilderness and a desolation (verse 10): the holy and beautiful house, where their
fathers had praised the Lord, had been burned with fire (verse 11): and then comes the
cry corresponding to that with which the chapter opened: "Wilt Thou refrain Thyself for
these things, O Lord? Wilt Thou hold Thy peace, and afflict us sore?"
Isaiah ends on the same note as does John in the Revelation, "Even so, come".
The wide creation makes the same appeal, while the church of the mystery is exhorted to
"live . . . . . looking for that blessed hope".
There can be no cry to Israel and Jerusalem of, "Comfort ye, comfort ye", without the
accompanying "voice of him that crieth in the wilderness,. Prepare ye the way of the
Lord". What John the Baptist did at the first coming of the Lord, Elijah is destined to do
at the second coming. Restoration and Return are inseparable.